Five Tips for Adopting an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

Successfully implementation of an ERP solution is a team effort involving your CFO, CIO and key players in your organization. To make the most of this essential technology, make sure to follow these five tips:

Spend time planning. Enterprise Resource Planning software provides management capabilities for finances, human resources and payroll, manufacturing and supply chain, project management and more. Within your organization, the departments handling these functions are probably using their own processes and systems, so if you are thinking about adopting an ERP solution, such as Microsoft Dynamics GP (Great Plains), you should start by devoting adequate time to the planning phase, conducting a thorough needs assessment. It’s important to understand the details of your company’s various business processes as these are all likely to be affected by an ERP implementation.

Get buy-in early. Equally important to your ERP planning is the need to prepare employees for the coming changes. If you can’t get your staff to use your ERP solution, then you’ve wasted your time and money. Include as many people as you can during planning phase by asking all levels of management and staff for their input. What data is important to them, how are they currently collecting it and what challenges do they face with their daily analysis and reporting needs? Knowing the answers is important not only for selecting the right ERP system, but also for engaging employees and demonstrating they have a stake in a successful ERP implementation.

Devote time to training: Make sure training sessions are tailored to meet the needs of each department or function, so that staff understands which parts of the ERP they will be using. Don’t overwhelm by trying to make everyone understand all the capabilities. Providing training sessions that are more job-specific and relevant make it easier to learn and boosts employee confidence.

Don’t overcomplicate things: If users become frustrated with overly complicated software, they will eventually abandon the system. Easy-to-use software, like MS Dynamics GP, with a user interface that looks and operates like the familiar Microsoft Office products, allows for customization that allows users to see only those functions they need.

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